Life Imanginable
by Dani Carretero
Summary: Max is the new kid in school. She wants to fit in, she wants to be accepted. She wants to live. But her past wont let her. Will Fang, the sarcastic realist, be able to help her break free?


**Disclaimer**: Um, James Patterson owns everything. Okay. Yeah.

**Summary: **_Max is the new kid in school. She wants to fit in, she wants to be accepted. She wants to live. But her past wont let her. Will Fang, the sarcastic realist, be able to help her break free? _

_**Life Imaginable**_

**Part one: The First Day**

_**Anxiety … Max**_

First day of school. Okay. I can do this. I just walk inside and smile. But not too much. Don't want to look creepy anything. Right. Breathe. Just ….

Shapes, sizes, colors, and sound all seemed to blend together as I pushed open the heavy metal door to Lawrence High School. My breathing was becoming rapid. _Calm, _I told myself sternly_, remain calm._

But how could I? This was Junior year and - more importantly - this would be my _sixth _new school … Calm.

Students whiz past me, chatting animatedly to each other. Younger kids - freshman probably - huddled together over schedules, complaining about the school's complex layout ( I've been to the open house. It isn't so complex)and making theories about how their classes will be. Older kids, more around my age, were leaning against the lockers talking about their summers, new clothes, new phones, how much it sucked that they got the infamously "crappy teacher" for math …

And here I was. Alone. Isolated. All the faces seemed to blur in front of me again. I swallowed hard. I would not freak out this time. The least I could do was give Dad one less thing to worry about.

Speaking of Dad … my phone was buzzing in my pocket. I found the nearest bathroom and locked myself inside a stall.

"Hello" I answered, a little breathlessly.

"Max." My Dad's voice was deep, reassuring. Home. "I just wanted to check if everything's alright …"

"Dad. I left your car not five minutes ago and your already checking up on me?" My voice sounded wry but inside I was glad he called.

"I know," he said "I just … well, I really want things to work out for you this time."

And by that he meant …. Right.

"Don't worry." My voice was confident, but my heart was racing. "I'll be fine. Everything will be fine. You'll see."

"Okay well … I guess I better …"

"I'll see you later Dad." I said, relieving him of an awkward good bye, and hung up.

Good thing too, because at that very moment, the bell rang.

Showtime.

_**Irritation … Fang**_

I tipped my head back and let out an exasperated sigh. First day of school. Big friggin' whoop.

Mr. Burke, our new physics teacher, and a new teacher to Lawrence High as well, jumped right into his - obviously rehearsed - intro. It including all the basics: a little back round on him, all the wonderful things about physics (ugh), his course line up, and of course how he is just so excited to get to know _us_.

"And you, young man, what's your name?" he asked, grinning stupidly when he finally reached my desk. He was short, kind of runty actually, and gave me the impression that he was the extremely ignorant type. You know, that idiot who is completely unaware of anything you say and only sees a Happy Fairyland version of the world.

I already knew from the get-go that we would _not _be getting along

"Fang." I'm pretty sure my tone carried the international signal for Back Off, but he didn't seem to pick up on it.

"Fang, huh?" His eyebrows furrowed a bit as he looked at his attendance one more time. I sighed impatiently.

"Jared. Jared Rodriguez is my real name. But I go by Fang."

Mr. Burke's expression cleared when he found my name on the attendance, obviously relieved he hadn't screwed up on the first day of the job. "Ah, I see."

"So, Jared." He began.

"Fang," I corrected .

"Yes," was all he said in response to that. He had on this patronizing smile that made me want to rip my hair out. " And, what did you do this summer?" Typical first day of school question.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Nope." All I really did was hang out with my friend Iggy by the bowling alley/arcade thing or at his place.

"Okay." He was still wearing that stupid smile. "What are your favorite things to do?" Oh for the love of …

"I like music." I was no longer staring at his face, but at the wall at this point.

Mr. B smiled, nodded and moved on to his next victim. The seconds ticked by. Finally, the loud obnoxious _briiiiiing_ of the bell sounded from the loud speaker and we were free to go.

I met up with Ig in the hallway.

"Brutal," he groaned as soon as I was in earshot. "Mrs. Kennedy is my home room teacher. Everyone knows what a complete witch she is. As soon as we stepped into the room I swear she glared at all of us like we had the black plague or something."

"Mm." I nodded "Sounds awful."

"How's your homeroom teacher? Mr. Burke, right?" He asked.

"He sucks." I said flatly. "He acts like we're in freaking kindergarten."

"Ah, well." Iggy stretched his long arms above his head. "At least we both have art next - which is pretty much the most brainless class ever. Ms. Warren doesn't even make us do anything … as long as we don't jump around or anything, we're golden."

"Yeah," I agreed " Maybe I can start drafting that paper for the contest during class…"

Iggy raised his eyebrows. "Seriously? You're taking him up on it?"

Last year, right before the end of school, a cool teacher I knew, Mr. Giovanni, suggested I enter this essay contest. It can be about any topic I want but it has somehow relate under a theme of Modern Society. I had my qualms about it … but recently, I don't know … I've sort of been tempted to give it a shot. The winner gets this huge scholarship and - well. I probably won't win anyway. It's a statewide thing, not just in this specific district, so ….

I simply shrugged in response to Iggy's question. Then added coolly "I'm thinking about it."

_**Please … Max**_

"_Just calm down." a deep voice murmured somewhere above my head._

"_No! No! Go away1 Make it go away!" I screeched_

"_She's going to have to be sedated I heard a female voice mutter._

"_No." My father protested "Just let her -"_

_Suddenly the agonizing feeling, not pain exactly, but just an unbearable emptiness, overtook me._

"_No!" I screamed at the top of lungs._

"_Baby -" My father began._

"_No, no, no!" My arms flailed about. "Make it go away!" _

"_This'll make it go away, sweetheart." Another unfamiliar voice told me._

"_Make it … go away …" I panted, frightened and exhausted._

_Then I felt a sharp jab on my right arm._

_My world was swallowed up in darkness._

"Hun?"

I glanced up to see my teacher, Ms. Garcia, giving me a concerned look.

"Are you okay?" She asked.

"Yes." I said, though I was a little out of it.

"Good." she said, and then strode away, back to her desk.

It was stupid of me to relive memories like that … especially during class. God knows what my expression must have looked like. But I couldn't help it. My heart was racing right now and I had squeeze my hands tightly to keep them from shaking.

The bell rang. It took me by surprise so I shot up so quickly the books in front of me slid of my tiny desk and onto the floor. Great.

Then this guy who sat beside me leant down to help me gather my stuff. I flinched away from him and then waved him off, "I got it."

His dark eyes flicked up at my face, then away again. He shrugged and walked out with the rest of the class.

I sighed and continued to shove my crap back into my bag. Was I really so socially retarded? Will I ever seem even remotely normal?

My Dad had put me through all sorts of therapy. One doctor guy accused me of having of BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder)

But somehow this felt like more … I can't describe it probably - but I don't think it's because of some mental illness or because I'm crazy. I just … I don't know.

That summed it up pretty well.

I contemplated this as I walked over to the library. It was pretty big. One half library, rows and rows of books, and the other half was basically a computer lab.

I walked over to a computer and pretended to research something . I was really just waiting for the time to pass.

Then suddenly time slowed all around. I felt my eyes go unfocused. Even my pulse slowed. Somehow I slid out of my chair.

Dark figures started looming over me.

"… please …" was all I managed to whimper before -

**Preview: Part Two: First Impressions**

"_Look I don't know who you are - or who you _think_ you are - but you don't know me. You know nothing about me." I said fiercely._

"_I don't think you know much about you either." He said, chuckling._


End file.
